Nelson graduated in 2002 from Florida State University in Tallahassee with a Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) and a Bachelor of Arts (BA) in Spanish. After working for three years as a registered nurse in the Surgical Intensive Care Unit (SICU) at University Health Care in Salt Lake City, he attended and graduated in 2008 with a Master of Science in Nurse Anesthesia (MSNA) from the Department of Nurse Anesthesia at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, still ranked first by U.S. News & World Report in nurse anesthesia.